Opinion Pieces

It’s now 12 years (and seven prime ministers) since John Howard promised to introduce a price on carbon and – despite emissions having increased to a new high and a number of big coal fired power stations having shut down – Australia still doesn’t have anything approaching a coherent climate and energy policy.

Trust in politicians is at an all-time low, the national debate is coarse and toxic, and the bar for what is judged politically acceptable is so low now that it feels like a cockroach could clear it. It's not unique to this election, but it feels like there has been a steep decline in recent years.

Australia is having a huge national debate about taxes and tax reform that's mostly missing the point. There's too much focus on costings and not enough analysis of who is getting the biggest slice of pie - here's a hint: it's not those struggling to make ends meet.

When a magician says you must look carefully at the cards that they’re shuffling, they don’t want you to see what their assistant is doing. And when a politician tells you to focus on one key economic issue, it’s a sure thing they don’t want you looking at the bigger picture.

Scott Morrison hopes he can make voters as scared of electric cars as he made them of refugees. It’s a tough ask but credit where it’s due: given his party managed to make a swath of voters afraid of wind turbines and fibre optic broadband, you shouldn’t write him off just yet.

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